Home-grown IT company wins Red Herring’s 2012 Top 100 Asia Award

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 2 — For three brothers, what started out as a hobby to earn pocket money turned into a successful IT company that recently won the prestigious Red Herring 2012 Top 100 Asia Award.

Kenny Goh, Henry Goh and Goh Chee Seng were 21, 18 and 15 when they started tinkering with computers, repairing them, creating websites, teaching people how to use computers and finding ways to start a business.

The three bright young men started a Malaysian community site back in the '90s called Cafe.com.my which featured local recipes, places to hang out in the country and probably one of the more generous free email services (they gave out 10MB worth of storage!) around.

"But that was never really our main business model. Our main business model is what we are doing now... being a multi-country mobile technology enabler," said Henry, group chief operating officer of Macrokiosk.

The idea was for Cafe.com.my to gain them some credibility and visibility so when they approached investors they would not be unknowns.

While other young people spent time watching movies, hanging out or shopping, the Goh brothers were learning pager technology.

"While we maintained Cafe.com.my, we were also into mobile technology but it was more about pagers then. The small little device was a bit of a nuisance because you had to ring a call centre to leave a message then it would beep and so on."

What they came up with was a way to broadcast messages to pagers. "We also helped businesses to leverage on pager technology. We helped them send thank you notes, congratulatory notes, doctor's reminders and appointments but at that time, it was broadcast to pagers," said Kenny, the eldest brother and group chief executive officer of the company.

At that time their father, who was a businessman, managed to get the master distributorship for a Japanese mobile phone. The boys thought it was a cool device because it could also send out SMSes... which was relatively new at the time.

This new technology would become the foundation of Macrokiosk’s business.

"In short, Macrokiosk is a multi-country mobile technology enabler because we don’t encompass ourselves in one mobile technology, although we started in SMS. But now we deal with things like SMS, MMS, WAP, USSD and so on. These are all mobile technology terminology," said Kenny.

Since its establishment in 2000, Macrokiosk has grown into a company that specialises in mobile services, mobile monetisation and telco-grade solutions, with a presence in 14 countries, serving 18 key industries such as aviation, banking and finance, IT, e-commerce, telecommunications, transportation and logistics, automotive, medical, advertising and marketing.

Starting out was a challenge for Macrokiosk because it did not have investors at that time but two years after the company was formed, Goldis Berhad (formerly known as Tan & Tan Development Berhad) invested in Macrokiosk.

One of the key technologies that was pioneered by Macrokiosk is the Transaction Authorisation Code (TAC) system which is used by most of the banks in Malaysia. It is a security procedure where users of online banking receive an SMS with a code that has to be keyed into the system before they can proceed with a payment or a fund transfer.

Despite travelling all over the world and having a presence in so many markets, the home-grown company is very much rooted in Malaysia, with 90 per cent of the engineers Malaysians.

The brothers have always had this mission and vision in them that we always want not only to prove to ourselves but also to prove that things can happen in Malaysia.

"Our definition of ‘things can happen in Malaysia' is you should be proud of who you are, you should look at your turf, your backyard instead of looking abroad," said Kenny.

Since 1996, the Red Herring 100 award has become a mark of distinction for identifying exciting IT companies globally and recipients of the award are regarded highly as the most promising ventures to look out for.

Past alumni of the award are companies such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo, Skype, YouTube and eBay.

"There were only two Malaysian companies that were recognised this year. For the past two, three years there were no Malaysian companies that got the award so we are quite happy about that. The key part is that it shows that this is the journey that we took, people are recognising that journey," said Henry.

To the Goh brothers, success is about constantly putting passion and effort into something they believe in.

"It’s an achievement but all these years we have never associated ourselves with the word success. I think we are very far from the word success," added Kenny.

Winning this award has made the founders of Macrokiosk more confident, hoping it will open doors that will allow them to meet more inspiring people and improve their business.

"I think another point is that this can happen to anyone. We are the living proof. We were brought up in a normal middle-class family, my parents knew no one.

"Whatever you see today is not overnight. A lot of people take shortcuts.

"What matters most is you got to believe in what you do because business is not a sprint. It’s a real marathon... no one said business was easy. There is no shortcut to success and you must be really passionate about what you do," said Kenny.

"My brothers share the same passion and our differences have complemented each other very well and led Macrokiosk to what she is today... not forgetting the collective relentless contribution and efforts by each and every employee of Macrokiosk. If I have to sum it up, we drive fundamentals and we drive objectives," said Chee Seng, who is group chief corporate officer.

Macrokiosk will be attending the Red Herring Global Top 100 Award event in Los Angeles in November.

For more information on Macrokiosk, visit www.macrokiosk.com

Find out about Red Herring Top 100 at www.redherring.com/top-100